The present invention relates to a material for protecting human bodies from harmful or poisonous chemical substances such as phosphorus agricultural chemicals.
When, for instance, phosphorus agricultural chemicals are applied to rice fields by scattering, the workers suffer seriously from the harmful or poisonous action of the chemicals through the skin. In order to avoid such harmful or poisonous action, the workers usually wear special work clothes which protect them from the chemicals, i.e. protective garments.
In general, the material, of which protective garments are made, is required to satisfy two functions, i.e. protection and mobility, which are contradictory to each other. When the protection function only is taken into consideration, a rubber coated cloth is usable as such material. However, the rubber coated cloth is not suitable from the aspect of mobility, because it is too heavy and stiff. In addition, owing to the lack of gas permeability, rubber coated cloth prevents the discharge of sweat or its vapor, causing heat stress to a wearer.
For overcoming such drawbacks, it was proposed to introduce a stream of air into a protective garment by a blower so as to make the pressure inside the protective garment higher than that outside. However, this proposal adds weight to the protective garment so that mobility is reduced.
Usually, a harmful or poisonous chemical substance exists in a vapor or liquid state. Therefore, the material to be used for manufacture of the protective garments (hereinafter referred to as "protective material") should prevent a harmful or poisonous chemical substance in a vapor or liquid state from passing therethrough to the inside, permitting the ready discharge of sweat or its vapor and the easy release of inside heat. Further, it should be light-weight, thin and soft so as to assure good mobility. In addition, it preferably should have excellent mechanical strength such as tensile strength and tear strength so as to allow its repeated use. Also preferably it should have high water and oil repellency while maintaining a good adsorptive property over a long period of time.